Laura is a Colombian biologist; she earned her bachelor’s degree in Biology from the Universidad de los Andes in 2016 and her master’s degree in Biological Sciences in 2023, also from the same university in her home country. Laura’s primary research interest is the ecological and evolutionary processes that affect pollination interactions. She is particularly interested in studying the gut and floral microbiomes to understand their role in maintaining or altering these interactions over time. For her master’s thesis, she described the first pollination network in Colombia’s páramo ecosystem. Despite the high altitude (over 3,000 meters), she documented a high diversity of floral visitors (90). At Penn State, she aims to understand the role that the gut microbiota plays in the diet-specific specialization of squash bee larvae.